Sleeping Beauty Dreams Big Read online

  Turning a more pleasant expression on the students, he spread his arms grandly. “When properly spun, that straw will be the gateway to untold wealth for the Academy, creating lots and lots of gold,” he told them. “And all that wealth will protect everyone and everything that the Grimm brothers brought here for safekeeping.”

  “So the search is on,” chorused the helmet-heads, “for that one special person who can spin the straw into gold.”

  At this second interruption, the principal got really cranky. “Stop it!” he yelled at the helmets. To Rose’s surprise he ripped off his hat, and began stomping his feet and jumping around like a crazed cricket. Or more like a three-year-old! Suddenly, he stumbled and toppled from his perch out of sight. Thonk!

  She gasped with worry, but everyone around her remained surprisingly calm. Did principals act like this all the time? She wouldn’t know. This was her first experience with a school, since she’d been tutored at home until now. Behind him, the five helmet-heads rattled and clanked softly on their high wooden shelf. “Calm down. Set a good example for our students,” they murmured.

  “Oh, shut your visors, you know-it-all can openers!” yelled the principal. Though Rose couldn’t see him, she could certainly hear him!

  Seeming to think better of his attitude immediately afterward, the principal climbed back up to the balcony railing, apologized to the helmet-heads, and addressed the students again. “There is a box outside in the hallway. Please write your name on a slip of paper and place it in the box. Students will be called out of class one by one in random order to give things a whirl. The spinning of the straw into gold, I mean.”

  He managed a sunny grin as he surveyed the crowd a final time. “That’s all, students. Off to class. And have a happily-ever-after day!”

  The musicians blared their trumpets again as the principal left the balcony. And after he was gone, all the students sat to finish eating. Minutes later, the Hickory Dickory Dock clock over in the east balcony end of the Great Hall, spoke up:

  “Hickory Dickory Dock,

  The mouse ran up the clock.

  The clock strikes eight.

  First class! Don’t be late!

  Hickory Dickory Dock.”

  When the rhyme ended, a mechanical mouse popped out of a little door above the clock’s face, which had eyes, a nose, and a mouth. The mouse squeaked cutely eight times to signal the hour. Its squeaks were followed by eight low-toned bongs that echoed throughout the Academy.

  Suddenly, dozens of bluebirds that had been flying in the Hall swooped down to the tables. Four of them gathered around each platter, picking them up with their beaks. At the same time, others dipped low in pairs to lift each small silver plate. Then the birds flew off, carrying the dishes behind a curtain in the Hall’s serving area. Within seconds, they returned. In their beaks they now carried small silver bowls of water and new white linen napkins, which they set before each student. Like everyone else, Rose dipped her fingers into the bowl she’d been given, and wiped them on the clean napkin.

  Afterward as they all stood to go, she realized she didn’t know the order of the classes she’d signed up for. Which was her first class of the day? Remembering that Ms. Jabberwocky had put the schedule in her handbook, she picked it up and tried to open it. Only she couldn’t seem to pry apart its cover.

  Pea nudged her with an elbow and set her own handbook on the table beside Rose’s. Then she pushed the oval on its front. At the same time, she said, “Scrying.” Instantly, her book flipped open to a section titled “Scrying.”

  “Your handbook is like your new best friend when it comes to information,” Pea explained. “Just tell it what you want, and it’ll fill itself with whatever you request.”

  “Oh, thanks.” Rose pushed the oval on the front of her handbook and said, “Class schedule.” Her handbook magically opened itself to the list of classes Ms. Jabberwocky had assigned. Including the two additional classes she’d added to make six.

  Grimm Academy Class Assignments for Rose:

  Threads

  Scrying

  Calligraphy and Illuminated Manuscripts

  Comportment

  Sieges, Catapults, and Jousts

  The Grimm History of Barbarians and Dastardlies

  “Ooh! Cool!” said Cinda, leaning over to look. “Red and I are in Threads first period, too. C’mon. We’ll show you the way to class.”

  Happily, Rose tucked her handbook in the crook of one arm and followed her new friends.

  On the way out of the Hall, the girls passed the sign-up box for spinning straw into gold. Rose knew her parents would have put signing up for such a job on the Danger List if they’d known about it. After all, spindles were sharp spikes used for spinning and twisting fibers.

  However the Danger List was gone, thanks to Ms. Jabberwocky’s fiery breath, and her parents weren’t here to forbid it. Always up for something daring, Rose gleefully put her name in the box, as did her new friends and many other students.

  As Rose, Cinda, and Red said farewell to Pea, Snow, and Rapunzel, Rose craned her neck a little, trying to look at Rapunzel’s hair without being too obvious about it. Had it grown even longer since yesterday? Now it draped the floor by several inches!

  Jousting Boy and some of his friends put their names in after the girls, she noticed, looking back over her shoulder. As she watched him, she saw a faraway expression come over his face. Suddenly, he stepped to one side of the hallway. Leaning against the wall, he pulled out a little notebook and a pen and began writing. When he glanced up again, he caught her watching him and looked a little embarrassed. Snapping his book shut, he moved on, adopting a tough-guy expression. What was that about? Sometimes, boys could be so grimmzany!

  In Threads class, everyone sat where they pleased instead of having assigned seats, so Rose pulled up a chair next to Cinda and Red. The teacher, Ms. Muffet, and her assistant, Ms. Spider, were helping students start crochet projects.

  “I’m always losing my sheep, so I think I’ll try crocheting a few collars I can string bells on to make it easier to find them,” said someone behind them. Rose peered over her shoulder to see a girl with her hair in a ponytail sitting behind her.

  A frustrated expression crossed the girl’s face just then and she began looking all around herself, checking the floor and her sewing basket. “Oh, creepers!” she complained. “I lost my crochet hook! Again. And has anyone seen the yellow yarn?”

  “Your hook’s tucked behind your ear, Little Bo Peep,” Red called. “And I think you might be sitting on your yarn.”

  “Peepers, thanks!” the ponytail girl called back. Looking delighted to have found both hook and yarn where Red had pointed them out, the girl set to work crocheting collars.

  Unlike everyone else in class, Rose only stared at her yarn and hook doubtfully. She figured her parents would approve of crochet. After all, it was done with a blunt hook, not sharp needles. She’d seen her maidservants crochet back at the palace. So she knew there was no chance she might prick her finger or anything. Still …

  She leaned over and watched as Cinda held her hook in one hand, and fed pink yarn in loops over the hook with her other.

  “Having trouble thinking of a project?” Cinda asked her.

  Rose nodded. She didn’t want to admit that she didn’t even know the first thing about crocheting. About any kind of sewing, actually.

  “You could make something for your family,” Cinda suggested. “I’m making gloves for my dad.”

  “And I’m making a hat for Wolfgang, a boy in my drama class,” said Red “He spends a lot of time in the forest and it can get cold out there.”

  Rose looked at the drawing Red had made of her idea. The hat she planned had two unusual triangle-shaped peaks on either side of the top.

  “Sometimes he shape-shifts,” Red explained, seeing her confusion. “Into a real wolf. With wolf ears.”

  Rose’s eyes widened. She’d never met anyone who could shape-shift, much
less into a wolf. “Oh!” she said. “I see. So those peaks on the hat will fit over his wolf ears. Good thinking!”

  She watched Red and Cinda work for a few more minutes before finally blurting out, “Here’s the thing. I’ve never done crocheting or any kind of sewing before.”

  Nearby, there was a gasp and a thump sound as Ms. Muffet overheard and fell off her tuffet at this revelation. But then she righted herself on the padded stool behind them. Leaving the student she’d been helping to continue working on her own now, she swung around and patted Rose’s hand. “Don’t you worry. We’ll have you doing all kinds of needlework in no time.”

  She was right. With a little direction, Rose caught on quickly, and decided to make a scarf for her mom. It started out a little lumpy, with some loose stitches and others too tight. But at least it wasn’t unraveling.

  And Threads turned out to be lots of fun with Cinda and Red in the class. Time flew by as the three Grimm girls chatted while they worked. Rose found out lots of interesting stuff about her new friends. Like that Cinda had gotten her glass slippers in the library just before a ball, and that Red’s basket had followed her around like a lost puppy until she picked it up. And that Wolfgang was actually Red’s crush, and that Cinda had a crush named Prince Awesome.

  When they asked if she had a crush, Rose shrugged carelessly, eyes still on her crocheting. “Not really.” Because who cared about having a crush? Not her! She had enough to worry about right now. A different C word than Crush was concerning her. And that word was Curse!

  “What’s your next class?” asked Red when the clock over in the Great Hall bonged the end of the period. The sound was apparently piped through the walls, so everyone could hear it anywhere in the school.

  “Scrying,” said Rose. “Snow’s stepmom teaches that class, right? Her name was in the changed Rumpel … I mean, in the changed tale in the Grimm brothers’ room.”

  “Right. Ms. Wicked,” Red said in a neutral tone.

  But Cinda appeared worried as the girls stood and put their projects away in workbaskets that would be left in the room till tomorrow. Lowering her voice, she said to Rose, “Remember that certain evil society we were talking about before? Ms. Wicked’s a member. So be careful.”

  Rose’s eyes went wide. She nodded, then the girls split up. When she entered the Scrying classroom on the first floor, she took a cautious look around. There were crystal balls of various sizes on shelves, small square mirrors hanging from little silver nails in rows on the far wall, and a glass-fronted cabinet full of strange books.

  And there were four melon-size crystal balls magically rolling around atop each of the square tables that filled the room. The students would likely use all those things to try to get a glimpse of events that would happen in the future, she guessed. That was, of course, what scrying was all about!

  She asked around until someone pointed her to an unassigned chair at one of the square tables. Once she was seated, a crystal ball rolled her way and parked itself on the table before her. “Uh, hi,” she told it. But it didn’t reply. Maybe it didn’t talk.

  Rose set her handbook beside the ball. Since there was no one else at her table yet, and there were still a few minutes before class started, she pushed the oval on the front of her book. “Rules,” she instructed it. The book magically opened itself to the very back where she found a list of numbered rules. She ran her finger down them till she got to number 37. It read: “No one is allowed to speak the principal’s real name.”

  “Why not?” she wondered aloud. Suddenly a clear bubble popped out of the book to hover a few inches above the page. Reason for Rule 37, it read. Lest he throw a doozy of a temper tantrum.

  “Oh, thanks,” she told the bubble in surprise. Then it popped and disappeared.

  So that was the reason you shouldn’t say the principal’s name aloud! Well, she was glad the other Grimm girls had warned her. If that temper tantrum he’d had during announcements was an example of what could result, she didn’t want to stir up his anger. At least he hadn’t stayed mad for long before he’d calmed down.

  Click! Click! Click! Rose shut her book and glanced up to see the teacher walk into the class, high heels clicking against the floor. Her jaw dropped as the woman drew closer, passing up the aisle. Because Snow’s stepmom, Ms. Wicked, was totally, completely gorgeous! Tall, with a heart-shaped face, her black hair was styled high on her head. She wore a large, spiked gold tiara, and carried a stylishly elegant black handbag.

  Rose watched her warily as she went to the front of the room. She couldn’t stop thinking about Cinda’s warning.

  Ms. Wicked wrote the day’s assignment on a large wall mirror at the front of the class instead of on a chalkboard like Rose’s tutors had used back home at the palace. And as she wrote, the teacher would pause now and again to gaze at her reflection in the mirror. Then she would pat her hair in place or straighten her high collar or adjust her necklace or tiara to a more pleasing angle.

  Wow, talk about vain! thought Rose. She wondered if Ms. Wicked was going to be able to look away from her own reflection long enough to teach class!

  Eventually, though, the teacher directed their attention toward what she’d written. “Today’s Assignment: Fairy-Tale Loopholes.”

  Rose sat up straighter. Huh? This was a weird coincidence. She and the other Grimm girls had just been talking about loopholes as they escaped the library this morning.

  “Please select one fairy tale or nursery rhyme of your choice,” Ms. Wicked went on. “It can be a tale from the writings of Grimm or any of the other fairy tales or nursery rhymes safeguarded in the Grimmstone Library.”

  She paused, then went on with an irritated grimace. “Unfortunately, our librarian, Ms. Goose, was unwilling, excuse me, unable to lend us the actual fairy-tale and nursery-rhyme books for classroom use. Therefore, you will use your crystal balls to gaze into the tales from afar instead. Please search for anything in the tale or rhyme you select that might be considered a loophole.”

  A murmur of confusion ran through the class, but then she explained further. “It could be as simple as a word, such as hole or crack or opening. Please note that extra points will be earned if you find unusual loopholes, other than actual words. For instance, anything in the tale or rhyme left unexplained. A story hole if you will. Or an illustration of an object, which contains a net, or some such hole-like thing. This will be an ongoing project, so take your time. Work carefully. Come to me with any questions.”

  Many of the students chose their own tales for their project. However, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that she and Sleeping Beauty were one and the same person, Rose chose the tale of Rumpelstiltskin instead. When she located it in her crystal ball, she saw that it was the altered tale, not the original one. She looked over at the teacher.

  Did she dare point out to her that the tale had been changed? Yes, she thought, her wild streak kicking in. Of course she did! She wanted to see how Ms. Wicked would react, so she could report it to the other Grimm girls.

  Taking her crystal ball, she went up to the teacher’s desk. Up close, she saw that although beautiful, Snow’s stepmom’s expression was hard and cold.

  “Ms. Wicked? I was wondering,” she began. “I chose the Rump —” She caught herself just in time. “I mean, Principal R’s tale. And I’ve noticed that it’s kind of different now.”

  Ms. Wicked’s eyes narrowed, and she seemed to go on red alert. But her voice was carefully casual when she asked, “Different? How?”

  “Well, the principal doesn’t spin the straw into gold in the book I found. Not like he did in the original tale,” she said. “In fact, in the version I just found you’re the one who —”

  “Oh, no, I think you’re mistaken,” Ms. Wicked said, smoothly cutting her off. “He never did spin it in his tale. All is as it should be.” She looked hard at Rose, her eyes glittering like dark diamonds. “You’re new here at the Academy. Briar Rose, correct?”

  She nodde
d. She was going to add, “just call me Rose,” when her gaze happened to fall on Ms. Wicked’s crystal ball. It was sitting on the teacher’s desk, and the title of the fairy tale she’d been reading was — Sleeping Beauty! Now it was Rose’s turn to go on red alert. This was certainly a worrisome coincidence, but she didn’t know quite what to make of it.

  “Well, mistakes happen,” the teacher said dismissively. “But good job. You may be seated now.”

  After that, every time Rose looked up from her desk, the teacher seemed to be watching her. Luckily, there were several versions of her story, and the one in the teacher’s crystal ball wasn’t one that used her actual “Briar Rose” name. So maybe she was safe from discovery. She hoped so, anyway.

  As class ended, Ms. Wicked called her up to her desk before she could leave for third-period Calligraphy. “It’s so nice to have you in my class,” she told Rose with a pleasant and disarming smile. “Your work today with the crystal ball was exemplary, especially since I assume it was your first time scrying?”

  Rose nodded.

  “Well, since you show such … talent, perhaps I’ll excuse you from homework this semester so that you can help me with a certain … special project. We’ll discuss this further another time. That will be all for now.”

  “Oh, okay. Thanks,” said Rose. Why, Ms. Wicked was kind of nice! Not cold and hard as she’d first thought, and not at all like the other Grimm girls had described her. Rose left the class feeling a bit confused, but pleased.

  Her third-period Calligraphy and Illuminated Manuscripts class was taught by Sir Peter Pen. He wore a green vest, green pants, and green hat, along with a white shirt and brown boots. And he moved around the classroom in leaps, sailing through the air as if on an invisible trampoline as he went to help students. Their assignment was to practice flourishes, which were embellishments added to handwritten letters of the alphabet to add beauty and visual excitement. Starting with an italic lettering style called Copperplate, she and her classmates used their pens to add swoops, curlicues, and swirls.